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I'm so angry I'm not really articulate.......

30 replies

Katymac · 25/06/2006 20:29

DD has come back from Brownie camp in tears for more than 3 hrs I have had weeping and hysterics

I have no idea if it is real or imagined

DD says a "friend" told someone about her etting the bed and that someone told everyone else

They were teasing her and spying on her about it

I have no idea if this is true

Her BF denys it - Brown owl et al no nothing about it

Has she been making it up?

What is going on?

OP posts:
Katymac · 26/06/2006 07:16

i think I am going down the line of....."Are these peoples opinions worth anything to you"

Trying to get her to see that she can only be hurt if she values what they think?

Unfortunatley some of the girls are at the new school

OP posts:
miniminx · 27/06/2006 18:29

My eldest son was bullied when he first started school and I couldn't work out what was happening and it took me too long to learn that you have to deal with it and deal with it very forcefully straight away.

I dithered at first because I couldn't understand what was happening and thought my son was overreacting to some mild ribbing (he found it very difficult to explain to me exactly what was said and done, which made it confusing for me). Then once I caught the bullies in the act and realised that he was being horribly bullied by much older boys who were clever enough not to get spotted by the teachers and dinner ladies. I've never forgiven myself for not dealing with his obvious distress in a strong enough way.

You need to talk with BO and tell her that your dd came home from camp in distress and that if she is ever to go back to brownies, you need to know that BO will be watching like a hawk and that dd knows that she can go straight to BO if there is a problem and trust her to sort it out.

Does dd want to go back to Brownies?

Of course it is possible that she is making this up because she has suffered at the hands of bullies in the past - I very much doubt that she has totally invented all the bullying. Even if this is so, you need to work o helping her feel more secure, not make her feel bad about it.

I would be straight with your dd about the fact that you are confused that her bf doesn't seem to know about stuff. I would explain that you really need her to tell you exactly what happened. Maybe at some point, you could also tell the story of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" to emphasise how important it is that she can tell you the truth.

If you make it clear that you will help her and not be cross if she did exaggerate a bit she may well be able to be straight with you. If what happened on camp doesn't sound too bad to you, you can talk through with her the fact that the other girls probably didn't realise how hurtful they were being, but don't undermine her right to be upset if she was upset by it, otherwise you will undermine her self esteem further - she could feel that not only is she worthy of teasing/bullying, but she is stupid to be upset about it.

There all all sorts of explanations for the bf saying nothing "bad" happened.

The one thing you do know is your dd is distressed and you just need to focus on helping her to feel supported.

My twenty pence worth - I do feel very strongly about this because my son spent years regaining trust in school and trust in me to protect him and I just wish I hadn't stuffed it up in the first place.

Katymac · 28/06/2006 07:01

Thanks for that Miniminx, I hope your DS is OK now

DD went to brownies and everything was fine - so I hope it has all blown over

OP posts:
miniminx · 28/06/2006 10:35

DS is fine now and we have a solid understanding about communicating what is going on. He knows that if he tells me exactly what is going on, I will know what to do. Any bullying gets nipped in the bud, but any oversensitivity on his part can also be talked through and we can find ways of making him feel better.

He is eleven now and is developing more distance from us, but I hope that the habit of communicating clearly with us when there is a problem will be something he can draw on when needed as a teenager too.

Anyway, I am very pleased that your daughter is ok now. It can be extremely difficult and frustrating when they are upset and you can't tell what is really going on.

From what my friends tell me, girls tend to do more talking than their mums can sometimes cope with, so maybe she was just venting and sort of knew that she had overblown the situation, but her emotions were running high?

The fact that she was happy to go back to Brownies suggests that it wasn't as serious as it could have been.

Best of luck.

bouncyball · 29/06/2006 19:10

Hi have no real personal experience with this as my children are too young but as a teacher know how spiteful and hurtful children can be too each other. Children can work together and if there's a ring leader there's often a few more to carry it on. Believe her and perhaps you could sit with her alone in a quiet room and ask her to help you to understand what it feels like. Maybe she could draw pictures of when it happened, where everyone was etc and then tell you what was said/done. Bullies can be very discreet and very quiet and your daughter may have been hysterical because she held her emotions until she found a safe place to release them...home and mum!! A comment about smelly wee followed by a nose twitch may then lead to the bullies making this facial gesture to her everytime she passed or sat next to her. That would really get to her over an extended period of time but be relatively unnoticed by adults.
Take her seriously she needs to rely on you, if you don't believe her who will? Is she really a liar!!

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